Needing thread and top stitch advise

[ritam]

I have a quilt that is ready for long arm quilting however I am stuck on what colour of top thread I should use for my quilt border. The border comprises of many square blocks of varying colours of blue and green. I would also like to do a ribbon candy pattern however I do not know how to curve this pattern around the corner. I have seen this run off the end and I do not care for the look. Would really appreciate se advise.

[ffq-lar]

Thread choices? Audition a middle-ground seafoam green or turquoise. Or try a variegated blue/green. If those aren't what you want, try a thin thread like BottomLine in yellow or gold. The thin thread won't overwhelm the piecing. Invisible thread is another option.

 

How to fit ribbon candy around a corner? Stitch your design to the corner and then make the turn by stitching a heart. The base of the heart will be in the seam corner and the top will lie on the diagonal in the corner, setting you up to continue the design down the side border. Another option is to fill the corner with a large loop, starting and ending at the inside corner. Again, it will be stitched continuously and allow you to start the side border. The blank space in the center of the corner can be filled with echoes or I've stitched the piecers initials or the year the quilt was made.

[Janice]

I would put a piece of plastic over the area and draw the design with an erasable marker. I would practice different looks until I got the one I wanted. Sometimes I draw the border corner on a piece of paper and put the design on it. You can cut-out around the design on the paper, transfer it to cardboard or copy to template plastic, cut it out and mark it on the quilt border. I just finished a quilt on whick I put a snowman panto. The snowman was too big to fit on the border (I would just get parts of him on the border). I copied the snowman design on paper (8 1/2 x 11) with a permanent pen, loaded it into my computer and printed it to fit the size of the border (6"). I tansferred it to cardboard. I copied and drew, with chalk, that little snowman all the way around the quilt on the border. I tried DeLoa's method with a large piece of plastic and the laser light

( from the front of the machine) but I couldn't follow it neatly. I think I would need Bliss to do that. I got pretty fast at drawing that little snowman.